Sometimes, youse bail me out. We’ve always prided ourselves in This Space on civil, smart dialog, so it wasn’t surprising when Jay Brinker, my pal and frequent Friday Hemingway, came up with this great question Monday night:

Of our three best-known jock miscreants over the past decade – Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods and Barry Bonds – which committed the most egregious sins against his sport?

It took me about five seconds to come up with my answer. Worst? Bonds. Then Armstrong, then Tiger, a distant third.

I will be soundly rebuked on this one, for not making Armstrong the main offender. He lied longer and cheated harder. He abused our affection more. After all, Bonds never courted public affection. Tiger couldn’t have cared less. They didn’t ask to be heroes. Armstrong did. He profited from it.

But here’s my thinking:

On his way to being our biggest sports liar and cheat, Armstrong, gulp, helped people. He survived cancer and inspired others to do the same. That has nothing to do with beating drug tests by using someone else’s urine.

No amount of performance booster helped him KO testicular cancer. That was all him. You could say his foundation did all the work on his behalf. I say so what? As bad as he fooled us, he also helped people.

Whom did Bonds help? I saw him on TV the other night when the Giants honored him for all those tainted home runs. Bonds looked. . . normal.

His head seems to have receded, his face is smooth and tight, not the bloated mass it was when he was juicing. Um, allegedly. He was pleasant, which is easy to be when every human in the ballpark loves you. Giants fans cut the Faustian bargain with Barry. Every home team would. We did it here with Pete for decades.

Bonds was generally unpleasant, and that was before the PED rumors began. He hit 73 homers at age 36, 45 at 39. He disrespected the game and all who play it. He could not have cared less.

His godfather, the great Willie Mays, urged last week that we give Bonds his due with a plaque in Cooperstown. As the generations churn and the more tolerant, stats-driven younger voters own a greater percentage of the ballots, Bonds’ Hall chances will increase. This year, 56 percent voted for him. He needs 75 percent. Bonds has four more years of eligibility before his fate is handed to the Veterans Committee, which will never let him into the Hall.

TML’s stance is well known. No Bonds. No Clemens, Sosa, A-Rod etc. I don’t buy any of the flimsy objections: No suspensions on his record, would have made the HOF without the juice blah, blah, blah. Bonds made a conscious choice to skew the game’s sacred numbers and dishonor the efforts of his peers.

As for Tiger, his wounds were self-induced. He has had crippling injuries that forced a damaging relationship with painkillers. He was as reckless in private as he was measured in public. For years, he treated his adoring public like junk. He’s in the middle of a heartening renaissance now, on and off the course. To me, he’s on the periphery of the discussion.

Then, of course, there are Jerry Sandusky and Larry Nasser, who are in a circle of hell all to themselves.

So… Bonds, Lance, Tiger. Your vote, and why.

Now, then. . .

REDS LOSE. WHY IT MATTERED. Homer Bailey wasn’t good. He can be a hard guy to feel sorry for, but I do. (I feel worse for fans who invest emotion and coin on a perpetually cellar-living club, but we’re talking about Bailey here.)

“I had close to a strikeout an inning. You see some positives here and there. Got the strikeouts when I needed it. I had a couple of misfortunes there in the fourth or the fifth." This was his description of how the evening went.

Misfortunes. Positives, you know, here and there. God love him.

BRANDON DIXON pitched the 9th last night, yet another position guy taking the mound. Some are getting all worked up over this. Kind of a waste of energy, yeah? Why burn a pitcher when you’re down 7 in the 9th? The Reds pitchers allowed 18 hits through 8. Dixon allowed none, and had a strikeout. None of the four guys that preceded him did that.

As bullpen use increases, we'll be seeing this more. It's better than expanding rosters to add another relief pitcher.

ROGER FEDERER could be the most gracious mega-jock ever. He sidled into an interview yesterday at the Tennis Center in Mason, offered a friendly greeting to a dozen or so of us and proceeded to give thoughtful answers for the next 15 minutes. I’ve seen him do this a dozen times, and every time he is pleasant and honest.

In a sport that starts seriously creating its stars when they’re in elementary school, the chances for weirdness are great. Federer played tennis at that age, too, but as he tells it, his parents never pushed him to do it, then managed it when he decided he wanted to be great.

In today’s TM column, I called Federer the most well-adjusted sports megastar of the past two decades. That’s hard to dispute. And oh yeah, he has more Grand Slam titles (20) than any man in tennis history. It really is possible to be a great athlete and a good human being. He has won the WS Open seven times. At 37, his time ain’t long. If you’ve never been to Mason for this event and you have a chance to watch Federer play or practice, I recommend it. GOAT sighting, just up the road.

Meanwhile, Serena Williams makes me glad I’m a guy, and I say this with all due respect and nothing but love and admiration for Serena Williams and the entire female species, OK?

She is playing here this week, but did not play in Toronto last week, because of what she suggested could be post-partum depression.

Being dominant internationally is monstrously hard to begin with. Then, you add that?

I have this discussion with my wife. Being a guy is so much better. Society still is more tolerant of men’s shortcomings, including our occasional lack of couth. We still get paid more for doing the same work, we still occasionally get preferential treatment in the hiring process. Not saying that’s right; saying that’s the way it is.

Men don’t sweat the niceties. We can insult one another without taking offense. Is there a female equivalent to smoking cigars and drinking beer on the golf course? Maybe there is. But I’m damned glad I’m a guy and feel free to smoke cigars and drink beer on the golf course.

TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul, is gravely ill. Hard not to love everything she did, but this one I thought was especially great. Turned this too-sweet Bachrach-David pop confection (originally done too sweetly by Dionne Warwick) into a forceful declaration of devotion. Today, Queen, we say a little prayer for you.